“Discard the junk…you are far better off to read a much smaller amount of good material with care and thoughtfulness.”
– Barton Biggs

Food for Thought:

• New Yorker – Overkill – Credit CW – Surgeon / author Atul Gawande is back with a follow-up to his seminal 2009 article, The Cost Conundrum.  An avalanche of unnecessary medical care is harming patients physically and financially. What can we do about it?
• MP – David Simon on Baltimore’s Anguish.  There have been lots of articles out about Baltimore and the issues there.  This interview with former Baltimore newspaper reporter and producer of HBO’s The Wire is particularly thought provoking.
• NYTimes – How Some Men Fake an 80-Hour Workweek, and Why It Matters.  Imagine an elite professional services firm with a high-performing, workaholic culture. Everyone is expected to turn on a dime to serve a client.  It can make for a grueling work life, except for one dirty little secret: Some of the people ostensibly turning in those 80- or 90-hour workweeks, particularly men, may just be faking it.
• Bloomberg – A League of His Own. A look inside the crazy corruption of soccer’s governing body and the quasi-dictator who runs it.
• NY Times – Love and Merit.  These two great trends [of parenting] — greater praise and greater honing — combine in intense ways. Children are bathed in love, but it is often directional love. Parents shower their kids with affection, but it is meritocratic affection. It is intermingled with the desire to help their children achieve worldly success
• WSJ  – Life Lessons from a Youth Baseball Coach.  Forget the competitive dads. To teach children about baseball—and life—a coach looks to their moms for help.
• WashPo – Want millennials back in the pews? Stop trying to make church ‘cool.  An interesting look at levels of religious engagement in the millennial demographic.

Business/Economics/Investing:

• Fortune – How the Dollar Store War Was Won.  When Family Dollar CEO and board member entered Carl Icahn’s 11,000-square-foot duplex, there they found Icahn mixing a batch of ­martinis. “Can I get you a drink?” Icahn asked CEO Levine. “I’d love one,” replied Levine, “but I’ll say no, since I want to keep my wits about me.” Icahn didn’t miss a beat. “Not drinking isn’t going to help you,” he fired back, “so you might as well drink.”
• QZ – What it’s like to run Google’s $2 billion venture capital fund
• Forbes – Baby Buffett: Will Bill Ackman Resurrect The Ghost Of Howard Hughes And Build A Corporate Empire?
• NYTimes – Daniel Loeb Strikes Back Against Buffett’s Criticism of Hedge Funds

Life/Culture/Art/Science:

• VF – Jeremy Piven on the Art Behind Ari Gold.  With the forthcoming Entourage movie, Jeremy Piven reflects on the character of Ari Gold.
• Medium – This Video Game Has Solved The Problem of Learning Guitar.  I tried taking lessons. I tried reading guitar tabs online. The only thing that worked was Rocksmith.
• NYTimes – Tell-Tale Signs of the Modern-Day Yuppie.  The hipster may seem to be the antithesis of the yuppie in his professional complacency, in his disdain for or ironic appropriation of everything mainstream. Yet all but the most bohemian of hipsters still relish the trappings of late capitalism
• WSJ – Deflategate: Taking the Air Out of the Patriotsssssss.  The first great book of the 2015 NFL season has been written, and it’s a doozy.
• R29 – Is Drugstore Shampoo Really Inferior To The Pricey Stuff – Credit MW
• WSJ – Young Guru Is the Most Influential Man in Hip-Hop You’ve Never Heard Of.  Hip-hop’s most trusted sound engineer—he’s worked with Jay-Z for the past 16 years—is lending his talents to Silicon Valley and the next generation of sound innovators.
• WSJ – Nowhere Is Safe From California Drought—Not Even Beverly Hills.  City is one of many ordered to cut its water consumption by 36%